Self-worth cannot be earned. It just is.

As I read about the Air India crash preliminary report a month after someone I knew died on that plane, I’m drawn to the silence that settled so fast. We’re here for just a moment. I wonder if I was to go with the flames tomorrow, would I be happy with how I lived today.

As I take a cheeky day off and collapse on the sandy beach face down, barely acknowledging the bubbling burnout, the fleeting stillness makes me ponder. Funny I chose to put it like that: even the stillness is fleeting, not still.

We always say things like I will rest when I retire. Or I will spend more time with […] when I accomplish this or that. But the truth is, there is always something to do. There is always someone to become. These days it is not necessarily about having more things but becoming someone.

So, have I become that someone I wanted? But if I never take the time to stop and think of, what is it that I really want, when will I know when I do?

I frequently find myself contradicting myself. Not trusting myself. Not listening to myself. I want one thing, but I often end up doing something else. And that discrepancy is eating me inside. At least by now I got to the point of recognising that. So, I guess that means I’m waking up.

I’m waking up to the idea that on a conscious level we say a lot of things. We might even believe that we want a lot of these things. Because on a conscious level it sounds right. Either because we were made to believe that this is what we should be wanting, or we don’t value ourselves enough therefore we want things that will give us that temporary value.

If I only lose a little bit of weight, I’ll apply for that job.

If I finish this project, I’ll allow myself some time off.

If I get this promotion and X amount of money, I’ll take the time to spend it with my loved ones.

But what if I never live that long?

You see, I am not being melodramatic. As I wrote in: ‘Good girls don’t cry, they plough through’, I abandoned myself at a very early age. Well, technically speaking it’s my parents that sort of abandoned me, but because as a baby, you have no other points of reference other than your carers, you abandon yourself too. Because if you were not lovable enough for them to care for you, why would you be lovable to yourself?

But now, after years of doing the inner work, I’m starting to grasp the predicament I’m in.

And I’m sad for that abandoned baby. And these days, I want to make it right. Before my plane takes off and there won’t be a landing back.

And so, I developed a rather silly technique to discern what is the voice of my Ego (that always needs to prove my worth and abandons the baby) and what is it that the baby wants.

So, I ask myself: what does the baby want? It helps to speak to myself in a 3^rd voice. Maybe because it’s always easier for me to care for others than for myself.

The baby wants to write. Even though it has no monetary value. And maybe it will never have. The baby loves to write.

The baby also loves to hike. And to meditate. No monetary value there either. In fact, the Ego would say: what’s the point of meditation? It achieves nothing. What’s the point to hike unless to burn some calories?

You see, my Ego told me to do so many things in the past. And I guess there was some fleeting pleasure in achieving some of these things. But there was no joy. In fact, there was always a deep, albeit swept under the carpet, feeling of dissatisfaction.

How many times I lashed out at people when I did all these things that I thought would make them love me and still, they didn’t.

But love cannot be earned. It just is.

When I listen to this baby, things always work out way better. And the work becomes almost effortless.

When I second-guess myself and listen to my Ego, I always get in a pickle. Because my Ego doesn’t have the best interests for the baby. It believes the baby is not good enough and therefore it needs to prove the baby’s worth.

When I don’t trust myself, when I don’t trust that inner voice (that baby) that I’m good enough unless for example I shrink myself to fit into the old pair of jeans (how random!) – it also means that I don’t like myself. And therefore, I will undermine and disrespect myself. And contradict myself. Which then further pushes me into not trusting myself.

If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”

– the Dead Sea Scroll

If we do not listen to this what is within us (our Soul, the baby), we will always undermine, disrespect and eventually abandon ourselves. Because you will never follow through if you don’t like or trust yourself. I wouldn’t fully commit to a project if I didn’t trust a person, would you?

We often confuse the idea of loving oneself with the narcissistic drive for doing things for ourselves. But the truth is, neither narcissists, nor people pleasers do things because they truly love themselves. They do them because they need the approval of others.

So, once again, what is it that the baby wants? Will you listen to your little tantrum-throwing people-pleasing Ego when it tells you that you are not lovable enough unless you […]?

Or, will you take the hand of your child, and go for that hike?

Before that plane takes off and there won’t be a safe landing back.